German unemployment falls in September despite supply bottlenecks

BERLIN (Reuters) - German unemployment fell in September, official figures showed on Thursday, suggesting that supply chain bottlenecks hitting industrial firms have not yet taken toll on recovery in Europe's biggest economy.

The Labour Office said the number of people out of work fell by 30,000 in seasonally adjusted terms to 2.508 million. A Reuters poll had forecast a fall of 33,000.

The seasonally-adjusted jobless rate remained unchanged at 5.5%.

"The labour market continues with its positive development," said Daniel Terzenbach of the Federal Labour Agency. "Unemployment and underemployment are both falling significantly."

Some 77.4% of German industrial firms reported difficulties procuring intermediates and raw materials this month, a survey published by the Ifo institute showed on Wednesday. Among car companies, that figure was at 97%, Ifo said.

(Reporting by Riham Alkousaa and Joseph Nasr, editing by Emma Thomasson)